A Child Called Freak
by Walks-in-Shadows
Summary: A six-year-old Harry Potter frees himself from his abusers, but is it really him who does the freeing? OoC!Snape. Warnings for the mentions of the after effects of severe abuse of multiple types.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: This fic is on FFN, not Fiction Press. Get with it. 'Nuff said.

Prologue.

As he watched the perfect family of three eating their dinners, he seethed with anger and resentment. They hadn't lived through what he had. They hadn't been starved, hit, called names, and worse. That's why they had to suffer, so they would know what people like him went through. After all, he _was_ a person, and he deserved to be treated as such. People like them needed to learn that.

That night, once the Dursleys were in bed, their attacker entered the kitchen, quietly got a butcher's knife from the drawer they were kept in, and went upstairs. He listened at the Whale's door and heard breathing behind it. Good, the boy was asleep. This should be easy. He crept into the room, up to Dudley's bedside, and drew his knife across the fat child's throat, cutting his vocal chords and leaving him unable to call for help as he bled out. This done, the predator went to the adults' room and did the same with Whale Senior, then Red Rum, as he thought of her. This had once been purely because of her resemblance to a racehorse, but now he thought of it, Petunia Dursley's slayer had to laugh when he realised the name was murder spelt backwards. Very appropriate. Thus, absolutely insane cackles issued forth from his mouth as the couple stared at him in horror before their eyes closed forever.

Now that all three Dursleys were dead, their killer went back to the kitchen and washed his hands thoroughly before doing the same with the knife, keeping it under the running water until it went cold for good measure, then he dried it and put it back in the drawer, went to the cupboard under the stairs and entered it before using his 'freakishness' to relock the padlock on the door and settling himself down to sleep. He might only be six and a half years old, but Harry James Potter was far from stupid, and he didn't want to go to jail for what he had done, not if what the Dursleys said about it being worse than their treatment of him was true.

Copyright © 2012 Romersa's Protégé. Individuals and groups are free to copy and share this work for non-commercial purposes. All other rights reserved.


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter One.

When the police arrived two days after the murders, in response to the neighbours' reports about the Dursleys being missing from their daily routine, they were shocked by what they found. Obviously, one of the family had pissed someone off to a great extent, as this was clearly an execution. Then one of the officers downstairs heard movement, and quickly tracked it to the cupboard beneath the staircase, his anger knowing no bounds when he saw the undersized, immature, and mute boy within. And Harry truly was mute; he had learned years before that noise of any kind from him would only earn him further punishment of some horrible type, so he'd quickly learned to make no sound at all. Now, when he cried, it was without the normal sobs of any other child; when he laughed, which was rare, his mouth gaped in the typical grin, but no whisper of breath could be detected.

The police officer who had discovered Harry reached into the cupboard and tried to pull him out, only to be met with flying fists and feet before the boy pulled himself back inside, then knelt and hugged himself, rocking with a ferocity suggestive of Autism.

Startled, the policeman tried a different tactic, and said in a gentle voice, "It's all right, you can come out now. No one's going to hurt you, I promise."

Not knowing whether Harry could understand him or not, the man was relieved when the boy crawled out of the cupboard after first cautiously looking around, as if ascertaining the veracity of the officer's words.

"What's your name?" Constable Jenkins asked.

Harry tried to answer, he honestly did, but he had been kept silent for too long, so could only shake his head after many failed attempts to speak.

"Can you sign?" the police officer asked this time, only to be met with a blank stare, so he tried again.

"Can you write?"

At this, Harry nodded his head eagerly. Yes, he could write. He wasn't too sure of his spelling much of the time, but the grown-ups had never caught him stealing books and abandoned learning materials from Dudley's second bedroom, things with which he'd taught himself quite a lot.

Getting out his notepad and pencil, Constable Jenkins put them in front of the boy and said, "I'd like you to write your name."

So Harry picked up the pencil and used it to painstakingly spell out, "F - R - E - E - K."

Shocked by this, the policeman nevertheless kept his voice gentle as he asked the child to write down everything he'd ever been called by the Dursleys, becoming horrified by the results that spilled onto his notepad. According to what Harry wrote, he'd been called boy, freak, little bastard, ungrateful, worthless, waste of space, waste of effort, waste of food, and sometimes even a waste of water, which would help explain the child's unwashed state. It seemed, however, that the one thing he'd never been called was his name, so it was unlikely he'd ever been to any school. If he had, he'd have been called by his name there at least a few times every day, enough to have learnt it.

"Where's your bedroom?" Constable Jenkins asked, and receiving no answer, enquired, "Where do you sleep?"

Harry silently pointed behind him to the cupboard he'd been found in, whereupon the police officer looked inside, becoming shocked and angry all over again when he saw the cot mattress, two thin blankets, and one flat pillow that passed for a bed, as well as the pile of clothing which, when investigated more closely, turned out to be far too big for the cupboard's inhabitant. Constable Jenkins had assumed that the hugely oversized T-shirt worn by the child in front of him had been purchased as nightwear, but his examination of the other clothes led him to the conclusion that it had been passed on from the boy lying dead in the bed upstairs. There was also a bucket that was half-filled with a slurry of faeces and urine. Perhaps…? Then the policeman shook his head. Impossible! This boy had been locked into his cupboard with a hefty padlock, of course he couldn't get out to commit the murders. They were obviously gang related.

"Come on," Constable Jenkins said softly, "get dressed and we'll get you out of here."

Alarmed, Harry shook his head and dived back into his cupboard, looking upwards with a fearful expression on his face, as if expecting Vernon to come down the stairs bellowing, "BOY!" as he often did.

Instantly understanding what this behaviour might be about, the police officer said, "They're gone, you don't have to be scared of them any more."

When the boy pointed in the direction of the front door with an anxious expression on his small face, Constable Jenkins restated, "They died. That means they're gone forever."

At this news, a beatific smile of pure joy spread over Harry's previously solemn face before he began to hunt through his pile of clothing for something halfway clean, and new horror flooded the policeman. Not because of the child's pleasure, but because of what he must have been through that learning of his tormentor's deaths caused the emotion.

Just a few minutes later, Harry appeared again, dressed in huge shorts and a jumper that he'd put on over the T-shirt he'd already been wearing, and a worn pair of trainers that were far too wide for his feet and a couple of sizes too big as a consequence. He wore no socks, and his rescuer didn't blame him; if the size of his footwear was anything to judge from, the boy's socks were sure to be enormous and probably uncomfortable. But just how did he keep the massive things on his feet?

Bending down, Constable Jenkins removed one of the oversized trainers and saw that a sock had been balled up and stuffed into the toe of it, a practical measure that nobody should ever have to adopt, then allowed Harry to replace his footwear before holding out a hand for him to grasp and taking him out to his squad car outside.

Immediately he saw the vehicle he was being led to, Harry began trying to pull away from his protector, who crouched down and grasped his shoulders.

"I don't know what you might have been told, but people are taken to the police station for many reasons. You're going there because it's a place of safety until we can get Social Services to come and collect you. You're not under arrest. Do you understand?"

Filled with relief, Harry sank to his knees as tears started to flow down his face, and Constable Jenkins gathered him into his arms, crooning soft sounds of comfort to soothe the obviously distressed child who clung to him with a fierceness born of long unsatisfied need. Then, once Harry was calm again, he was picked up and placed in the back seat of the squad car, the seatbelt being fastened for him when he made no move to do it himself, before he was driven to the local police station.

- 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 -

Once Harry was seated comfortably in an office at the police station, Constable Jenkins asked him if he was hungry, only to be met with a denial. This initially puzzled the man - after two days without food, he'd be ravenous - but then he realised that the boy had probably gone without food often enough that he no longer knew what hunger felt like, if he still felt it at all. So the policeman got a sausage roll from his own lunchbox and broke it in half, taking one piece for himself and beginning to eat it as he offered the other to Harry. The child snatched up the food and started to cram it into his mouth whole before he was stopped.

"I'm not going to take that away from you, so eat it slowly. If you try to swallow such a large mouthful, you'll probably choke, and my sergeant would have my guts for garters if I allowed that to happen!"

Harry obeyed the instruction, casting suspicious glances around himself as he did so, but true to his word, neither the police officer nor any of his colleagues made any attempt to take the food away from him, and he finished it five minutes later.

After another half-hour of patiently waiting, the social worker who had been assigned to Harry's case finally showed up at the police station, and was himself extremely shocked that the reason there was no name on his new charge's case file was because he didn't officially have one, not knowing what it was. The man was also horrified when what he'd read about the circumstances of Harry's discovery was confirmed by Constable Jenkins.

"The child can't speak, but he can write what he needs to say, which I'm rather surprised by given that the level of his neglect is extreme, to say the least," the police officer stated.

Just then, the boy in question appeared and plucked at his sleeve, received a piece of paper and a pencil, and used them to write, "Can Freek have drink?"

"Now that's not a very nice name for a handsome little boy like you, is it?" the social worker asked, and Harry, noticing him for the first time, instantly fell to the floor, curling up in a foetal position and putting his hands over his head in a self-protective gesture.

"What's the matter?" the social worker then asked.

"Being larger than average, you look a bit like the man of the house I found the boy in. It's possible he thinks you're him."

The social worker crouched down and said, "Hey, kid, my name's Thomas Croft, and I'm not the man who hurt you. Okay?"

Then Constable Jenkins also crouched down before saying, "This is the social worker I said would be coming to collect you. Do you remember me telling you that?"

Cautiously, Harry looked up and took a longer look at the strange man. His large size did make him look like the man he'd grown to dread, but his hair was grey rather than mousey, and he had no moustache. So the child got up and smiled at him tentatively while grasping his protector's sleeve, then tapped the paper he'd written on, reminding the policeman of his request.

"All right. Would you like some milk?"

Frantically, Harry scribbled, "No, milk burns!"

"Milk shouldn't burn. Maybe whoever gave it to you put something nasty in it, but I promise not to do that. Okay?"

After saying this, Constable Jenkins called for someone to bring a cupful of milk to the room they were in, then when Harry just looked warily at the white fluid, asked him, "Do you think I'd drink something I know would hurt me?"

Harry thought about this. Maybe before he might have not have felt confident in anything this man gave him, but he had eaten half of the sausage roll earlier with no ill effects, the other half of which was still making the boy's stomach so deliciously full. However, it wasn't this man who had poured the milk and brought it in its disposable cup, it had been a woman that Harry didn't know, so he simply watched as Constable Jenkins showed him the milk, drank a mouthful of it, then showed it to him again so he could see that the level of it had gone down.

Harry now knew that the milk was safe, but he took a minute sip first just to be sure, then another, larger one. When nothing bad happened, he began to gulp it like he was dying of thirst, only to have the cup jerked from his mouth by a hand on his wrist like the sausage roll had been earlier.

"Slow down, child. If you drink it like that, you'll make yourself sick."

Harry obeyed, keeping a cautious eye on the two men, but true to the policeman's word, the cup wasn't taken from him until he had finished its contents. Then Constable Jenkins had something he needed to ask.

"Why do you eat and drink so fast?"

"It gets taken from Freek if Freek not fast enuff," was the answer.

"Who did that?" Thomas asked.

"Aunt and Uncle."

"Well, they were bad, nasty people to do that to you," Constable Jenkins averred.

"There's no record of the Dursleys having a nephew, only a son," Thomas stated, looking through the case file. "Both adults had sisters, but there's no record of Lily Evans, Petunia Dursley's sister, after seventeen years of age, and Marjorie Dursley is childless. Our department investigated any possibility of this boy being a relative of the deceased, and those are the only two. This child is too young to have been born to the seventeen-year-old Lily Evans, and there's no missing child record that fits a boy his age, nor any birth record for him with her name on it."

There was more discussion between the two men, then the social worker said that it was time to go, causing tears when Harry realised that Constable Jenkins would not be going with him.

"Hey, kid, it's all right. You'll be safe, and if your foster parents allow it, I'll come and visit you."

"I'll make sure they know how important it is for you to visit the child," Thomas promised before finally leading Harry by the hand from the police station.

Copyright © 2012 Romersa's Protégé. Individuals and groups are free to copy and share this work for non-commercial purposes. All other rights reserved.


	3. Chapter 2

Chapter Two.

Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, put the roll of parchment he was reading down on his desk, went to his fireplace, then tossed in a handful of Floo powder before sticking his head into the green flames and clearly saying, "Professor Snape's office."

Luckily for Dumbledore, Severus Snape, Potions Master and the Head of Slytherin House, was indeed in his office, marking the Gryffindors' potions parchments with a vicious smirk on his face as he gave each one lower marks than the students deserved. His head shot up instantly when he heard the headmaster's voice.

"Severus, could you come through, please?"

"Albus, is there any chance that what you want can wait until I'm finished here?"

"I'm sorry, but no. This is of the utmost importance."

Snape gave a frustrated sigh as he put his quill to one side, then he got up and moved to the fireplace before turning the flames green once again with his own handful of Floo powder.

"Now, what is it that couldn't possibly wait?" Snape asked once he'd refused Dumbledore's usual offers of a sherbet lemon and tea.

Fortunately for the Potions Master, his superior decided to get a bit more straight to the point than was usual for him.

"Do you remember a few weeks ago when it was discovered that Harry Potter's relatives had been murdered and he'd been removed from the house by the police?"

Snape did recall the discoveries just over a fortnight prior; how the blood wards on the Dursleys' house had been shown to have failed without tripping the alarms in Dumbledore's office, suggestive of the fact that they had failed gradually rather than immediately upon the deaths of Petunia and Dudley Dursley; there was also the discomforting revelation that Harry had been entirely unwelcome in his family's home, evident by the fact that he was not in any of the muggle photos on display in various places around the house. It was Dumbledore's belief that this was the reason the cousin had been murdered first, because he had been mistaken for Harry, the adults simply being killed for good measure. He thought it probable that the muggle method of a knife had been used so the anti-magic wards the Ministry put on the houses of underage muggleborn witches and wizards wouldn't be tripped and summon help before the child the murderer believed was Harry Potter had died.

After this information ran rapidly through Snape's head, he confirmed that he recollected it for the older man before waiting for him to continue.

"Well, it seems that young Mr. Potter has once again been found."

It was at this point that Severus Snape was glad he always refused Dumbledore's offers of tea and sweets, because he felt sure that he'd have been choking on one or the other by now if he didn't.

"And you're telling me this because…?" the Potions Master asked once his mouth was working properly again.

"I've made some arrangements with the muggle organisation, Social Services. You're to pose as the boy's uncle on his father's side when you go to fetch him from his foster home."

"And _I_ have to do this because…?"

"I would have thought that would be obvious. Since both you and Mr. Potter have black hair, that will be seen as a familial trait, reducing suspicion, and there's also the love you had for the boy's mother and your life debt to his father to take into account."

Snape's groan was almost audible. The question seemed to be, how much _didn't_ the headmaster know about him? Again it took a few seconds for the Potions Master to find his voice.

"Fine, tell me where the spoilt brat is, and I'll go and fetch him. Although I doubt he'll be pleased to be dragged from the lap of luxury."

"I would reserve judgement before you call Harry spoilt," the headmaster said in a sharp tone, "and I doubt that he has ever known luxury, going by the reports from the Order agent I posted in Little Whinging."

Snape snorted as he flung a handful of Floo powder onto the fire, then he stepped inside and was whisked to the Three Broomsticks in Hogsmeade, outside of which he transfigured his robes to muggle style clothing before apparating to Surrey.

- 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 -

The object of Dumbledore's search was sitting at a table, contentedly eating small portions of fish fingers, chips, and beans. He had been at the foster home for three weeks, during which time he'd been taught how to use the toilet, and was no longer called Freak because he had been allowed to choose his own name as soon as he'd arrived.

- 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 -

"Freak's an insult, not a name. Wouldn't you like to be called something else, kid?" Harry's foster dad asked him.

"What is the pleece man called?" the boy wrote.

"The policeman that took you from your old home?"

Harry nodded.

"His name's Constable Michael Jenkins."

"Can I be Mykul Jenkins too?"

"Don't you think that would create too much confusion between the two of you? You should pick a different first name."

Harry thought about this, then remembered a box that a games console his cousin had been given the previous Christmas had arrived in. The young wizard wasn't really sure of what the words 'Entertainment' and 'System' might mean, but he recalled looking at the first word and wishing he had that for a name instead of Freak.

"I want to be cawled Nintendo."

"That's the name of a company, not a person," the child was told, but he just kept stubbornly tapping his piece of paper, and wouldn't listen to any of the alternative suggestions given to him, thus becoming Nintendo Jenkins.

- 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 -

Since his arrival at the foster home, Nintendo had been given small portions of food quite often in order to increase the size of his shrunken stomach to what it should be, and he was now on larger meals with the portion sizes of the snacks he ate in between gradually being decreased. He was currently being home educated because he had problems with other children, and also to enable his dietary regime to be followed until he no longer required it.

Once the young wizard had finished his meal, his foster dad, Jason, and his foster mum, Siobhan, told him that his uncle would be coming to see him, and a cold wash of dread swept over him as he took in this news before suddenly jumping up from the table and pelting upstairs, the adults following behind.

- 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 -

When Severus Snape arrived at the large house that Harry Potter was staying at, he found the place in chaos, two adults and four or five teenagers dashing around and looking for something in several places. Shaking his head in disbelief, the Potions Master approached the woman.

"Hello, may I ask what you're looking for?"

"Nintendo," the woman replied before going to look somewhere else.

Snape could barely believe his ears. These people were conducting a frantic search for a muggle entertainment device right at the time of his visit? Just then, however, he was able to stop the man in the middle of his search.

"Hello, I've come to see Harry Potter and possibly take him back with me."

"Who?"

"Your youngest foster child."

"Oh, you're Nintendo's uncle?"

It was Severus' turn to be confused this time.

"Didn't anyone tell you about his new name?"

"You're searching for 'Nintendo'?"

"Yes. As soon as we told him you were coming to see him, he ran off to his room and we haven't been able to find him since."

"You lost him in his bedroom?"

"Well, we think he left the house through the window, and since nobody's seen him in the park or near the shops, we're concentrating our search around here."

"I see. May I wait in his room until you find him?"

Jason acquiesced to this request and gave the Potions Master the necessary directions, then continued in his search as the other man climbed the stairs.

Snape entered the brightly decorated room and saw that the window was open, which was probably why it was thought the child he had come to fetch had left that way, and the valance round the base of the divan had been disturbed. It was as he looked further round the room and saw the open wardrobe, however, that he found the boy the other members of the household were looking for. Nintendo was sat in the bottom of the large piece of furniture, wrapped in a perfect disillusionment spell, and the only reason that he could be seen at all was because of the unnatural displacement of the clothes inside, something that had earlier been missed by the panicked searchers.

"Your foster parents are sick with worry over where you might be," Severus said, sitting on the edge of the bed. "You do know that, don't you?"

There was no answer, but the hangers in the wardrobe rattled as the clothes on them moved.

"I wish you'd come out of there," the man continued. "I did come all the way from Scotland to see you, after all."

All of a sudden, a boy dressed in well-fitting jeans, jumper, and socks, as well as wearing a pair of glasses that looked like they were brand-new, appeared in the wardrobe before crawling out and standing up, looking apprehensive and fondling himself through the front of his pants.

"That's better. You're Nintendo, I take it?"

The child nodded in diffident confirmation.

"And what's your other name?"

When no answer was forthcoming, Snape asked, "What's wrong? Can't you talk?"

Nintendo shook his head just as reticently as he had nodded it, and lightly touched the front of his neck just before Siobhan came into the room.

"There you are, Nintendo! Please don't run off like that again, you scared Jason and me. Where did you find him?" she asked Snape, then shouted, "Jason, it's all right! I've found Nintendo, he's fine!"

"He just walked into the room," the older wizard lied.

"I see. Nintendo, this is your Uncle… What's your name again?"

"Severus Snape, but I'm not this child's uncle, I'm his cousin."

Recognising how daft Dumbledore's story was because of the fact that he and James Potter were the same age as well as having different surnames, the Potions Master had decided to alter and elaborate on it.

"You're cousins?"

"As were Harry's father and I."

"Oh. Why wasn't he living with you?"

"James and I never got on as children, and when we became adults, we naturally drifted apart. I heard he'd had a child, but then he and his wife, Lily, were killed when young Harry was fifteen months old. Since there was a married aunt on the mother's side to take the boy in and because I'm a single man, I was never asked. Also, because I lived on Jersey until recently, I didn't know that Harry had been removed from the house until I decided to get to know him after moving to England."

"Why did you live on Jersey?"

"Because that's where I grew up, and I inherited my parents' house after their deaths."

"Okay. And why do you call Nintendo Harry?"

"Because that's his name, Harry James Potter. It's what his parents called him."

"Well, you'll have to discuss it with him because when he came here, he'd never been told his name. That's why he chose a new one: Nintendo Jenkins."

At the mention of his full name, Nintendo, over whose head the adults' talk had been passing, looked nervously at Siobhan, and she said, "Don't worry, Nintendo, you're not in trouble. I was just telling your cousin your new name."

"You are my cuzzun?" Nintendo wrote on a pad he'd been given to communicate with.

Severus read what had been written and answered, "Yes I am, Nintendo."

"Like Dudley?"

"Nearly. Dudley was your first cousin, and I'm your first cousin once removed."

"You are not my uncle?"

"No, child. The person who said I was made a mistake."

By this time, Nintendo was nervously rubbing himself through the front of his jeans once again, but instead of telling him off for this behaviour, Siobhan simply sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled him onto her lap, stroking his head soothingly as she rocked him.

"So why was Harry, I mean Nintendo, allowed to choose his own name in the first place?" Severus asked.

"He'd never been called anything that we would recognise as a name, so nobody knew it. Since me and Jason didn't think it was appropriate for him to be calling himself Freak -"

"But Nintendo?"

"He insisted on it, wouldn't hear of being called anything else once he'd said that's what he wanted his name to be."

Nintendo had fallen asleep by now, so Siobhan took off his glasses and put them on the bedside cabinet, then laid him on his bed before getting a cotton cell blanket from the top shelf of the wardrobe and covering him with it, finally leaving the room and going back downstairs, Snape following her.

Author's Note: I double checked with the UKIPO before I wrote this chapter. Using the name Nintendo on a games console I made and am selling would get me into legal trouble, but using it as a character name is A-OK. Just before anyone brings up the legalities. Oh, and I won't create any warnings for OoC!Harry because in my considered opinion, Canon Harry is OoC. After all, how does someone survive abuse without at least _some_ psychological damage? One last thing: the reason Harry's use of a locking spell didn't bring the Ministry running was because it would have been seen as a minor case of accidental magic with no effects, and thus ignored.

Copyright © 2012 Romersa's Protégé. Individuals and groups are free to copy and share this work for non-commercial purposes. All other rights reserved.


	4. Chapter 3

Chapter Three.

When Snape and Siobhan got to the lounge, they found that Thomas Croft had arrived and was sitting in an armchair across from Jason, who sat on the couch, so Siobhan took a seat with her husband as the Potions Master sat in the remaining armchair. Once all the adults were comfortable, their discussion began, Severus repeating his 'cousin' story for the benefit of the other men before being given a report on Nintendo's history and condition.

"It took a while for Nintendo to get used to me and Jason touching him, and he's still wary of the other young people." Siobhan said. "It seems that Dudley committed more of the physical abuse than even the adults did."

"Also, Marjorie Dursley, Vernon's sister, was fully aware of the abuse and did nothing to stop it," Thomas finished. "Her arrest came swiftly when she heard about the murders and stated her opinion that 'that unnatural freak', as she said, must have had something to do with them. It seems that she had visited the house annually, yet reported nothing of what she witnessed Nintendo going through, even joining in herself verbally and by allowing her dogs to attack him."

"I was wondering if Nintendo has fully settled down here, or if I can take him home straightaway?" the Potions Master asked. He had observed some of his own boyhood behaviour being displayed by the child sleeping upstairs, and it had made him let go of his hate for Nintendo enough that his instinct was to hide the boy to make sure he never again experienced such treatment as the Dursleys had obviously inflicted upon him.

"I see no problem with that if you think you can handle a child who is still highly disturbed. You'll have to keep up with his special diet and his home education; he's currently seeing a child psychologist, so you'll have to find a replacement; and he'll need to learn how to be around other children his age without feeling threatened by them. That last point is why I placed him in a foster home that normally only takes in teenagers."

All of a sudden, Nintendo appeared by Thomas' side and touched the man's arm before using BSL Makaton to ask Siobhan for a drink.

While Nintendo's foster mum got up and went to fulfil his request, Thomas said to him, "Well done, Nintendo! Pretty soon, we'll have you shaking my hand."

Just then, Siobhan came back into the lounge, but as she crossed it, she stumbled and dropped the beaker with Nintendo's squash in it, causing the liquid to spill all over the floor. The moment he witnessed the mishap, the child's hand flew straight to his crotch, and he backed against the nearest wall as his eyes widened in fear.

Siobhan went to him, grasped his shoulders gently, and said, "It's all right, Nintendo. It was just an accident, and I'm the one who caused it."

Unfortunately, however, Nintendo had gone beyond hearing her, and he wound up hyperventilating as he slid to the floor in a defensive position.

Snape took command by ordering everyone else out of the room, then he broke through the boy's shields, knelt beside him, and began to stroke his upper arm, softly chanting, "It was only an accident, no one's to blame," over and over.

Eventually, Nintendo's breathing gradually slowed, and he reached out to the man who was giving him comfort and reassurance, allowing him to pick him up and sit with him on his lap in an armchair before calling the other adults back in.

The first person to re-enter was Jason, and the moment he did so, he breathed, "Amazing!" as he took in the scene in front of him, the child sitting calmly on the lap of a virtual stranger. As the others came back into the room, he went over to Nintendo and asked him, "Are you all right there?"

The boy nodded and signed, "Can I stay with my cousin?"

"If you want to and it's all right with him," Jason said.

"It's absolutely fine with me," Snape said.

"Why don't you make Nintendo his drink while I clean up the mess I made?" Siobhan added before starting to do just that with a cloth she'd got from the kitchen.

She had just begun, however, when the cloth was taken from her by Nintendo, who started wiping up the yellowish fluid from the carpet instead.

"Nintendo," the woman asked, "do you remember our rule? Only the person responsible for something has to sort it out. Now you go and sit with your Cousin Severus while I clean this up."

"Why don't you teach me some of your signs so I can start learning how to know what you're saying?" Snape asked.

The child sat back on the Potions Master's lap, and after another half hour, the man knew the signs for yes, no, hello, goodbye, please, thank you, hungry, and thirsty.

- 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 -

Once Nintendo's clothes, books, few toys, and security blanket had been packed, Severus led him to a quiet place, said, "Stand close to me and hold on tight," then apparated away.

Unfortunately, Hogsmeade was busy by the time they reached it, so there were plenty of witnesses to the boy pulling free from the Potions Master and fondling himself as he sank to the floor, tears of fright pouring down his face. Without further ado, Snape opened the suitcase he was carrying, summoned the security blanket from it, and gave it to Nintendo, filling with relief when the boy took his hand from his crotch in order to grab the soft piece of fabric and hold it close to himself.

Once Nintendo had calmed down sufficiently, Severus sat on the suitcase and pulled him onto his lap before saying, "It's all right, apparition is just a way to get from one place to another very quickly."

"Aparishun?"

"It's a form of magical transportation."

"Thair is no such thing as majic. Aunt and Uncle told me so."

"Yes, well, they lied about that. There certainly _is_ such a thing as magic, and I just used it. As did you, earlier."

"I used majic?"

"Do you remember when you were hiding in your wardrobe? Didn't you wonder why none of the others could find you?"

"They cud not find me becaus I did not want to be fownd."

"Actually, you couldn't be found because you were invisible. Your desire to stay hidden caused a small outburst of accidental magic, creating a powerful disillusionment spell, and that's why nobody could see you."

"Am I a majishun?"

"No, Nintendo, you're a wizard like me."

Nintendo seemed to think about this, then he wrote, "Wear are we?"

"We're in Hogsmeade, the only village in the UK where every person living in it knows about magic. That's because it's near Hogwarts, where we're going."

"Hog Worts?"

"It's the school where I teach and where you'll be staying from now on."

"I can go to skool like Dudley did?"

"Well, you can't go to Hogwarts until you're eleven, but maybe you can attend the primary school here in Hogsmeade once other children frighten you less."

"All rite, you will teech at Hog Worts and I will go to skool."

Nintendo tucked his pad and pencil back into his pocket, then once the Potions Master had got up, put his blanket back into his suitcase, casting a wistful glance at it after he had done so. Once the piece of luggage was picked up after being closed again, the child grasped Snape's hand and was led down the village street en route to Hogwarts.

- 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 -

As soon as he came to the gates of Hogwarts Castle, Snape pointed it out to his young charge, who immediately stopped still and took in the view extremely quietly.

"What's the matter, Nintendo?" Severus asked quietly.

Nintendo pulled out his pencil and pad, and wrote, "It dos not look like any of the skools I saw in Dudleys books."

"That's because there are schools in many different buildings, Nintendo. But I happen to agree with you. Hogwarts _is_ unusual, being in a castle."

The Potions Master held out his hand once Nintendo had put his things away again, and they walked hand in hand along the curved path that ran beside the lake until they reached one of the doors that led into the Entrance Hall of the castle.

Copyright © 2012 Romersa's Protégé. Individuals and groups are free to copy and share this work for non-commercial purposes. All other rights reserved.


	5. Chapter 4

Chapter Four.

Severus and Nintendo had no sooner walked through the door of the Headmaster's office than Dumbledore was up and crossing the floor towards them, holding out his hand and saying, "I'm very pleased to see you once again, Harry."

The child made no response other than to back away, and the Headmaster asked, "What's wrong with the boy?"

"Oh, nothing apart from over five years worth of abuse of varying kinds," the Potions Master answered, sitting down, "and by the way, he's no longer called Harry James Potter."

"But that's his name!"

"That's as maybe, but he's no longer called that, he's called Nintendo Jenkins."

"What? Why?"

"I would have thought you'd be in a better position than I to answer that question, seeing that you're the one who left him with people who called him nothing but a litany of verbal abuse."

"But what about the Dursleys' own boy?"

"Who grew up repeating what his parents called his cousin, and subjected Nintendo to worse than they did in the way of physical abuse, along with his little gang of hooligans? By the way, your 'uncle' story was pathetic, and I had to pose as the cousin of the child's father."

All this time, Nintendo had been listening to the argument without really understanding much of it, and thus had backed away from the men to press his body against the wall of the office, his eyes closing as he nervously rubbed himself. Thus it was that he never saw Dumbledore getting up from behind his desk, and the first he knew of this was when he was grabbed by the white bearded wizard, who opened a door which led into a type of stationery cupboard, shoved the boy inside, then slammed it closed again before locking it with a spell.

Immediately his charge was pushed into the cupboard, the Potions Master shot up and crossed the room, just too late to prevent the warding spells being put in place. Instantly, Severus had his wand out, pointed at the Headmaster.

"Open it."

"No, I won't. I shouldn't have to watch the boy engaging in that type of activity, he is far too young for it."

"Well, you've just guaranteed more of the behaviour. Merlin knows how far you've put Nintendo back in his recovery! Now open that door, or I won't be held responsible for how I cause the failure of the spells holding my cousin prisoner."

"Harry is not your cousin!"

"As far as he knows I am, and he's no longer called Harry, he's called Nintendo. Now let him out!"

Snape began to recite the spell for a particularly strong and painful stunner that he'd learned as a follower of Voldemort, and Dumbledore hastily dropped the spells that kept the door of the stationary cupboard locked, knowing that his Professor of Potions could have chosen worse. Unfortunately, when the cupboard door was finally opened, it was clear that the damage had already been done. Nintendo was on his knees, facing inside of the very small room, and he had his arms wrapped around himself as he rocked back and forth, tears streaming down his face.

Severus immediately got down on his own knees to stroke the child's arm again, but he had only just touched him when he was violently fought off. Nintendo issued forth a thin, hoarse scream as he lashed out, but he quickly cut it off by clamping his lips shut. The Potions Master was almost in tears himself when he witnessed this evidence of just how bad the abuse his cousin had suffered from had been, but he held them back as he began to softly sing:

"Do do, l'enfant do

L'enfant dormira bien vite

Do, do, l'enfant do

L'enfant dormira bientôt"

The man had chosen this simple verse because his own mother had sung it to him when he had been a small boy, and he knew the comfort it could bring, so he repeated it many times until Nintendo's rocking had lessened in ferocity and he was only moving in time with the melody. Snape reached out again, and this time found himself with his arms full of distressed six-and-a-half-year-old boy, his robes rapidly becoming wet as Nintendo continued to cry, his hand once again between his legs.

The Potions Master picked his cousin up and carried him back into the main room, saying to Dumbledore, "Get out."

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me, you malicious old coot. Get out!"

Looking shocked, the Headmaster nevertheless did as he was ordered, and once he'd gone, Severus sat in a chair and again opened Nintendo's suitcase, getting the boy's security blanket out, giving it to him, and sighing in relief when it worked as it had in Hogsmeade.

He removed his cousin's glasses, and with a quick whisper of, "Tergeo!" soon had them clean once more before placing them safely on Dumbledore's desk, then he simply wrapped his arms around Nintendo, stroking one still too thin shoulder with his much larger hand. The two sat like this for just a while longer, then the child looked up at the Potions Master with red, swollen eyes before starting to get off his lap and holding his blanket out with an expression of disgust on his face.

"What's the matter, Nintendo?"

"Ownly babies hav blankits."

"Now who told you that?"

"Tina did."

"Well, I think Tina's forgotten her own blanket from when _she_ was six, don't you?"

Nintendo said nothing to this, simply staring up at his cousin with a puzzled look, and Severus, correctly guessing the reason for his charge's bewilderment, said, "Everybody has a security blanket when they're six, even I had one and wish I still did. In fact, no one is ever too old for a security blanket when they need one. Okay?"

Nintendo nodded, happy once again, and clutched his blanket to himself as he put his glasses back on, Snape having just handed them to him, before putting away his pad and pencil again. Then the man closed the suitcase and set it floating behind him as he grasped his cousin's hand and led him from the room. There was one near miss outside the office as a result of Dumbledore's presence, but the Potions Master was able to get Nintendo down the moving spiral staircase without too much effort.

- 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0 -

Madame Pomfrey ushered Severus into her office, closed the door, and waited until both she and her colleague were sat down before she began to speak.

"I'm quite frankly astounded that young Nintendo has managed to survive as long as he has. The sheer amount of old skull fractures should have finished him off long ago, yet his brain shows no sign of damage. It's my belief that his magic concentrated on healing that before focusing on other areas, which would help explain the state of the rest of his internal organs. In fact, any more damage to his spleen and he simply wouldn't have one! It's rather obvious that those awful muggles never took him for treatment of any kind for the injuries they inflicted on him, and they must have given him a corrosive to drink at some point, as his oesophagus and stomach were all but eaten away by it. The scars from that still remain, making it easy to guess what happened, and only a witch or wizard could have lived through it."

"Is that a part of why he can't speak? Because his trachea was burned?"

"No, the story there is rather more complicated than that. It seems Nintendo has suffered from conversion mutism from a very early age, and hasn't used his vocal chords in so long that they've atrophied, making it amazing that he was able to scream earlier. His eyes were damaged by long periods spent in near total darkness, but if they're fixed, he'll no longer have to wear glasses since he never inherited his father's myopia. Also, everything including the effects of undernourishment will be fairly simple to heal since he's still growing, but he will need to see a speech therapist and a mind healer for some time to come."

Just then, both adults were startled by a commotion coming from the infirmary, and they dashed out of the office to see Albus Dumbledore being held against the wall five feet from the floor by magic, Nintendo clutching his security blanket very tightly against his face as his antagonist yelled in consternation. Severus processed all of this in slow motion before dashing over to the bed his cousin was sat on, kneeling down by it, then reaching out and softly stroking the back of the boy's hand.

"Hey, it's Cousin Severus. Maybe you should let the old bastard down now."

Nintendo turned and, seeing that the Potions Master was indeed the one speaking to him, allowed Dumbledore to crash to the ground as he tearfully flung himself into his current protector's arms. Snape wrapped his arms around the child for what felt like the millionth time that day, and pointed his wand at the Headmaster as the older man limped up to Nintendo's bed, supported by Madame Pomfrey.

"I simply wished to apologise to -" here, the older wizard hesitated, "Nintendo for hurting him earlier."

"So you approached him once you were sure I wasn't around to protect him? You presume too much, old man. In fact, I may cease my employment here to make my cousin safe if you continue to traumatise him. Poppy, please place the old fool in a bed as far away from this one as possible, and release either him or Nintendo quickly."

Madame Pomfrey said to Nintendo, "You'll be able to go with your cousin to his quarters soon. Won't that be nice?"

However, the boy merely stared at her solemnly, as if he didn't know how to respond to her smile.

Copyright © 2012 Romersa's Protégé. Individuals and groups are free to copy and share this work for non-commercial purposes. All other rights reserved.

('Do Do, L'Enfant Do'; Public Domain.)


End file.
